Page 83 of His Captive
He can punish me later for disobeying him—if he’s still alive. I mutter a few more prayers, but it doesn’t do anything to slow my racing heart or quell the concern that has my stomach twisted into a knot.
“Is that the same static from the night Massimo’s wife was killed?” Sarah asks, leaning forward.
“Yeah, it looks like it is,” Cadence confirms. “It’s recent, too. I’ll have to download the footage to isolate the frequency. This is going to take a few minutes.”
More time. Time we don’t have. TimeMassimodoesn’t have.
“Oh, shit,” Cadence says. “That’s a Bratva vehicle.”
“They’re involved?” I question. “I thought Massimo took them all out.”
“Not everyone, it seems,” Cadence says. “The vehicle is registered to a company in Russia, just like the others. Different company, but they don’t hide stuff as well as the Dirty Vegas Mafia. It’s the same parent company.”
“Which means Emilio and his wife are working with them,” I sigh. “Any sign of Massimo?”
“No, hold on. I’m still trying to find angles that give me a better view.” Cadence keeps typing, downloading, and decrypting the masked footage. Every second feels like an eternity. “There’s two people in the back seat. That’s Emilio!”
“Is he… unconscious?” Sarah asks, leaning forward.
“I think so,” Cadence says. “And look, from this angle, we can see Erica in the front seat. The guy who is driving… I don’t recognize him, do you?”
“No, he’s not on my Mafia true crime wall,” Sarah replies.
I put the pieces together in my head. Erica is the one who did this. She has to be. If Emilio is unconscious in the back seat of the car, then he wasn’t involved. Or he was, and his wife turned on him, too. Either way, if there’s any chance of saving Massimo, time is of the essence.
“This is the last image I can get,” Cadence says. “There are no cameras after this that I can access from here. All I see is warehouses, so those security cameras are likely only accessible if you’re on their network.”
“That has to be where they took Massimo and Emilio,” Sarah mutters. “I’m checking the properties, but nothing is registered… well, there are a couple registered to corporations that aren’t based in the United States.”
“I bet those are the ones they have hidden behind shell corporations,” Cadence says. “But we can’t exactly go search them ourselves.”
“No,” Sarah admits with a sigh. “Even if we found Massimo and Emilio, there’s no way we could help them considering how many guys were in those vehicles. We’d be throwing our lives away, too.”
Sarah’s right. I know it, but I can’t accept it. If there’s a way to save Massimo, I have to try. I close my eyes and shake my head. I know what I have to do, and this is a really, really bad idea, but I don’t have a choice.
“I need an address,” I say, standing up and running to the door.
“To where?” Sarah asks.
“Salvatore Morandi’s h-house,” I stammer. “Or wherever he might be. Cadence, see if you can figure out where he is from the cameras.”
“Lea, no!” Sarah shakes her head. “Are you crazy? If you start talking about hitmen and accusing his daughter-in-law of murder, you’re not walking out of there!”
“I know,” I reply, swallowing the lump in my throat. “Find him. Text me the address.”
I end the call, grab the keys from the wall, and rush into the garage.
I’ll risk anything for Massimo.
Even my life.
CHAPTER 36
Massimo
I’m not sure if the blood dripping from my hands is coming from my wrists, which have been rubbed nearly to the bone, or the wound in my shoulder that bled through the bandage before Lea helped me put it on.
The drugs have mostly worn off, so I’ve my wits about me, but they’re not much use right now.
